Catheters are medical devices commonly used for a variety of medical procedures and purposes, including cardiac ablation and treatment techniques. Typically, a catheter used for endocardial procedures include an elongate, flexible body that extends from the device handle. Not only is the flexible body sized to be positioned within the patient's vasculature, but the flexible body must also be flexible enough to be navigated through the patient's body and steerable enough to be positioned at the target treatment site. Therefore, the elongate body must contain the necessary device components, such as pull wires, shims, fluid delivery and recovery lumens, electrical wires, and others, depending on the type of the device. Consequently, an elongate body may need to include a plurality of lumens or channels therein to accommodate all these elements and, in many cases, keep them isolated from each other (for example, some components may need to be mechanically, fluidly, thermally, and/or electrically isolated from others).
Not surprisingly, these features may significantly add to the manufacturing cost of the catheter body and the device as a whole. Each type of catheter body must be designed and manufactured independently, with very few, if any, designs being a one-size-fits-all design. Additionally, including a plurality of lumens within the catheter body may not only take up valuable and limited space within the body, but may also decrease the overall flexibility and steerability of the body.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide a catheter body that includes a central lumen that can be used to center certain components, such as pull wires and guidewire lumens, and that also remains flexible. It is further desired to provide a device that can be incorporated into a simply manufactured catheter body (for example, an extruded tube) to provide these benefits and to reduce manufacturing costs.